Names of wire targets due out

Judge orders release of identities of nine people recorded

Published 11:05 pm, Tuesday, May 7, 2013

Responding to a petition filed by journalists, a federal judge will unseal a document containing the names of nine people who were recorded last summer by former state Sen. Shirley Huntley, D-Queens.

Huntley pleaded guilty in January to siphoning money from a non-profit organization to which she had steered state funds; she's scheduled to be sentenced Thursday in federal court in Brooklyn.

Last week, prosecutors revealed in a pre-sentencing letter that Huntley wore a wire for several months in pursuit of a cooperation agreement with federal investigators, and in a separate Tuesday filing said their sentencing memo — which will detail the extent of her cooperation — contains the names of eight people under investigation. Six of those people are elected officials. One of the nine is not under investigation.

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District Judge Jack Weinstein agreed with members of the courtroom press corps that the public's right to know outweighed the danger of compromising any ongoing investigations. He scheduled the unsealing of the memo for 2 p.m. Wednesday.

"Those recorded through defendant's assistance can infer who they are by information that is publicly available and by their own knowledge of contacts with Huntley," Weinstein wrote. "It is well known that widespread investigations of New York State legislators and related officials are being conducted by the government. ... Every legislator who has conversed with this defendant will necessarily assume that he or she was recorded under the supervision of the FBI.

"There will be no surprises to the potentially accused by the revelations of their names," the judge continued. "Interference with ongoing investigations will be of almost no significance."

He closed by rebutting the prosecutors' argument that worthy candidates would turn away from politics out of fear of seeing themselves identified in an investigation.

"Since this country's beginning, when Jefferson, Hamilton, Burr, and others began developing the art of American politics, anyone who entered the arena of government has understood that his or her good name may be unfairly sullied," Weinstein wrote. "Yet, the honor and excitement of serving the public has not inhibited our best people from entering the fray of politics. To paraphrase President Harry Truman, 'Those who cannot stand the heat should stay out of the kitchen.'